Photobucket, one of the first companies to build a Windows 8 Metro app, tells …

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With Windows 8 and its radically redesigned Metro interface, Microsoft is offering software developers a new set of challenges and opportunities. Rather than reusing tactics from building for previous versions of desktop Windows, developers are creating applications in the style introduced on Windows Phone, and making them work across the larger screens of multitouch tablets and keyboard-and-mouse-driven PCs.

With the Windows 8 Consumer Preview out, many developers have already built preview versions of the apps they plan to offer Windows 8 tablet and PC users. We spoke with the creators of Photobucket's Windows 8 application to get their take on the Metro development process.

The beta-quality Photobucket app was built in Visual Studio 11 using C# and XAML, said Luke Swanson, VP of engineering at Photobucket, and Jerome Laban, a developer for Photobucket contractor nVentive. For the new Metro user interface, Photobucket was able to reuse some code originally made for Photobucket's Windows Phone application.

Code convergence

"We were able to use the C# library that we built for Windows Phone to interact with Photobucket APIs, and reuse that in the Windows 8 platform," Swanson said.

"We took an approach directed at developing on both platforms," Laban added. "That's why we were able to share a lot of code."

The Windows 8 application will work across both x86 and ARM systems. But Swanson is hoping that Microsoft provides more convergence across platforms after Windows 8 is finalized.

"One thing that would be nice is the convergence of Windows Phone, the Metro interface, and even down the line the Xbox and other platforms. Having the ability to have more code reuse, especially on the UI side, across those platforms is something that would be extremely powerful for Microsoft," Swanson said. Ideally, he said, "a developer could build a Windows Phone application and the majority of that code could be ported over to be used on the Windows 8 metro interface or even on the Xbox."

Do users want Metro, "regular" Windows, or both?

The biggest challenge for Microsoft—and application developers—in Windows 8 may be the task of building applications and user interfaces that work well across both desktop and tablets. Photobucket, which already has mobile apps for iPhone, iPad, Android, Windows Phone, and BlackBerry, is building new applications both for Windows 7 and Windows 8.

Photobucket will eventually decide whether to merge the "traditional" Windows desktop application with the Metro-styled one.

"We're looking at the pros and cons of that," Swanson said. "The Windows 7 application we're working on right now sort of monitors the file system and uploads photos to the Photobucket cloud asynchronously in the background, and the Windows 8 application we've built has a much richer user interface and is more about the consumption, viewing, browsing and sharing experience. We're looking at whether we can combine those two into one application or if we can keep the background uploading and syncing application as a separate program."

The adoption rate of Windows 8 and the Metro interface compared to Windows 7 will play a big role in Photobucket's planning, Swanson said.

Windows 8 apps are not silos

Windows 8 does offer some advantages over existing versions of Windows, Swanson and Laban said. The various "contracts" Windows 8 offers developers are plug-ins aimed at letting applications work seamlessly together instead of acting as isolated silos of data. The file picker contract "allows our application to work with other applications in the Windows 8 environment without having to know anything about them," Swanson said.

This, for example, would let Photobucket share photos to a Facebook application. Alternatively, PowerPoint could more easily grab a file from Photobucket.

In previous versions of Windows, "there's no way to share content from one application to another without knowing exactly what you have to exchange between the two," Laban said. "This is very powerful for us. Previously, it was pretty difficult to do that kind of stuff across a wide range of applications."

Live tiles, which show updated application information on the start screen, are another new development that offers something unique. They let Photobucket show users notifications and photos other users have uploaded, or other types of updates, before they even click on the application icon. "That provides a richer experience even when you're not using the application," Swanson said. "You can get a quick snapshot. It's completely different from anything iOS or Android supports right now."

Background processing—but not too much

The ability to share data across applications with contracts is more similar to Android than Apple's iOS, he said. Like Android, Windows 8 also allows more background processing than iOS, but it doesn't get too crazy because of battery life concerns.

"The background processing is specifically designed for scenarios like real-time communication, audio streaming, updating the user tile," Laban said. "It's not a free-for-all. It's understandable, it's important to have the longest battery life possible. You don't want applications running in the background all the time and doing whatever they want."

Although Photobucket aimed to make the application "touch-first," it also made sure not to neglect keyboard-and-mouse users. "We used a lot of Microsoft's recommendations with regard to how to build a good Metro application," Swanson said. "It's sort of making sure that it's touch-first, thinking about how big hit targets are and not doing things like a hover that don't work on a touch interface, and really taking advantage of the contracts, and the horizontal scrolling."

While Windows 8 applications are designed to be full-screen, developers also have to support a "snap view," a miniature version of the application for when users have multiple windows open at once. By the time Windows 8 is released as a final product, the Photobucket application will expose many more Metro capabilities.

"I would consider it a phase one beta," Swanson said. "For phase two, we want to implement video uploading and playback into the experience. We want to take advantage of Windows 8 metro features like semantic zoom, which lets you zoom out and present the content differently at different levels based on how zoomed out you are. We think there's some interesting things you could do there, and some better integration with the share contract. We feel like the application we have out there is a great starting point and a great beta to get feedback from users."

42 Reader Comments

I think the lack of background computing might be a real drawback to Metro. I am thinking of an application such as Adobe Lightroom where you might want to apply a filter to many photos at once; let it think for a few minutes; and come back and everything is done.

Am I correct that Metro applications will be frozen in the background, unable to do this computing?

Arrrrgh. I want to rip my eyes out every time I see Microsoft's recent GUI paradigm.

Please Microsoft, reinstate visual distinction between interactive and non-interactive interface elements. The elimination of all visual cues from GUIs is fashionable, but it is also constitutes needlessly poor interaction design.

I think the lack of background computing might be a real drawback to Metro. I am thinking of an application such as Adobe Lightroom where you might want to apply a filter to many photos at once; let it think for a few minutes; and come back and everything is done.

Am I correct that Metro applications will be frozen in the background, unable to do this computing?

I think they were talking specifically about tablets. On a PC I don't imagine there would be limitations.

I think the lack of background computing might be a real drawback to Metro. I am thinking of an application such as Adobe Lightroom where you might want to apply a filter to many photos at once; let it think for a few minutes; and come back and everything is done.

Am I correct that Metro applications will be frozen in the background, unable to do this computing?

Yes, but that kind of intense processing application is one that is likely going to remain a "Desktop" app for some time, as the desktop paradigm fits productivity needs more than this first version of Metro was designed to. I imagine as it gets updated and improved, there will be more control over background processing, and perhaps a battery-sensitive mode where a plugged in system allows Metro apps to run full-scale processing in the background when plugged in, but then tombstone when unplugged, etc.

I think the lack of background computing might be a real drawback to Metro. I am thinking of an application such as Adobe Lightroom where you might want to apply a filter to many photos at once; let it think for a few minutes; and come back and everything is done. Am I correct that Metro applications will be frozen in the background, unable to do this computing?

I think they were talking specifically about tablets. On a PC I don't imagine there would be limitations.

The limitations are universal among Metro applications. There is no distinction between a tablet and a PC.

I think the lack of background computing might be a real drawback to Metro. I am thinking of an application such as Adobe Lightroom where you might want to apply a filter to many photos at once; let it think for a few minutes; and come back and everything is done.

Am I correct that Metro applications will be frozen in the background, unable to do this computing?

Even in iOS and certainly in Windows 8, apps are are allowed to run in the background for a short time (5-10 minutes) if they explicitly enable it, but they cannot run indefinitely. Two apps I can think of off tr top of my head that do this on iOS is LogMeIn, which will keep an active remote connection, and Instacast, which will continue downloading podcasts in the background if you switch away from the app (even if no audio is currently playing). Both Microsoft and Apple want to avoid draining battery life on portable machines.

I have also noticed that Windows 8 is less aggressive in suspending Metro apps on non-portable devices that have lots of RAM, like you'd expect.

The limitations are universal among Metro applications. There is no distinction between a tablet and a PC.

And this is the exact thing that Microsoft doesn't get. There's a hell of a difference between a monstrous, powerful desktop and a dainty little tablet. I can run lots of processes on my desktop and I wouldn't even notice a thing until one starts actually hammering the CPU, causing the fans to spin up. On a tablet, a few background processes are very noticeable as they'll start to slow it down and reduce the battery life.

Arrrrgh. I want to rip my eyes out every time I see Microsoft's recent GUI paradigm.

Please Microsoft, reinstate visual distinction between interactive and non-interactive interface elements. The elimination of all visual cues from GUIs is fashionable, but it is also constitutes needlessly poor interaction design.

I'm with you, brother, for this reason and so many others. Innovation to make things better is great, innovation for the sake of just doing something different is lame, and that is what metro is on the desktop. Ironically, I find the wasted space of each square and the total covering of the screen induces in me a sense of suffocation.

What they are talking about is what an app is allowed to when it's not the active application.

So in your example, Lightroom could make an app that processed multiple photos "in the background" and it would work fine as long as you were using that app.

However if you switched to a different application, then Metro (and iPhone) and limitations about how much and what kind of processing the app can do.

In other words the issue is background applications, not background tasks (asynchronous work). Maybe you already knew that but just to clarify...

Lemurs wrote:

petwalrus wrote:

I think the lack of background computing might be a real drawback to Metro. I am thinking of an application such as Adobe Lightroom where you might want to apply a filter to many photos at once; let it think for a few minutes; and come back and everything is done.

Am I correct that Metro applications will be frozen in the background, unable to do this computing?

Yes, but that kind of intense processing application is one that is likely going to remain a "Desktop" app for some time, as the desktop paradigm fits productivity needs more than this first version of Metro was designed to...

I think the lack of background computing might be a real drawback to Metro. I am thinking of an application such as Adobe Lightroom where you might want to apply a filter to many photos at once; let it think for a few minutes; and come back and everything is done.

Am I correct that Metro applications will be frozen in the background, unable to do this computing?

Yes, but that kind of intense processing application is one that is likely going to remain a "Desktop" app for some time, as the desktop paradigm fits productivity needs more than this first version of Metro was designed to. I imagine as it gets updated and improved, there will be more control over background processing, and perhaps a battery-sensitive mode where a plugged in system allows Metro apps to run full-scale processing in the background when plugged in, but then tombstone when unplugged, etc.

Indeed. Metro is currently mostly suited for lightweight 'prosuming', but I think Microsoft will develop Metro into a fully capable system over time. This might take years. First the simple prosuming, then the average office stuff, then the real productive stuff. In the mean time, the desktop will be the system to use for office and heavy production work.

The limitations are universal among Metro applications. There is no distinction between a tablet and a PC.

And this is the exact thing that Microsoft doesn't get. There's a hell of a difference between a monstrous, powerful desktop and a dainty little tablet. I can run lots of processes on my desktop and I wouldn't even notice a thing until one starts actually hammering the CPU, causing the fans to spin up. On a tablet, a few background processes are very noticeable as they'll start to slow it down and reduce the battery life.

Please explain your logic as it seems that you don't get it. You can only have two truly active applications in Metro at the same time. Pretty much everything else will be in an inactive state in the background. So what exactly is there no to get here? These limitations exist for a reason, and the performance differences between ARM and x86 was most likely a driving factor. So how exactly does MS not get it?

The fact is that ARM Windows tablets are going to be consumer devices, they are not meant to be running full fledged desktop apps. If you want a full fleged desktop experience on a tablet with multiple applications running in the background, you will have to go the x86 route.. period..

I expect overtime that this may change over time as the inefficiencies between the two platforms become mitigated, but that is going to take some time.

If you want a full fleged desktop experience on a tablet with multiple applications running in the background, you will have to go the x86 route.. period..

The point is that if you want to have multiple Metro applications running in the background, you simply can't. It doesn't matter how powerful your system is, you're forced down to the lowest common denominator. Which is a POS ARM tablet with 1GB RAM.

The limitations are universal among Metro applications. There is no distinction between a tablet and a PC.

And this is the exact thing that Microsoft doesn't get. There's a hell of a difference between a monstrous, powerful desktop and a dainty little tablet. I can run lots of processes on my desktop and I wouldn't even notice a thing until one starts actually hammering the CPU, causing the fans to spin up. On a tablet, a few background processes are very noticeable as they'll start to slow it down and reduce the battery life.

Bolded for emphasis. I imagine the desktop/workstation type apps (which will not be Metro apps) will work as expected.

The limitations are universal among Metro applications. There is no distinction between a tablet and a PC.

And this is the exact thing that Microsoft doesn't get. There's a hell of a difference between a monstrous, powerful desktop and a dainty little tablet. I can run lots of processes on my desktop and I wouldn't even notice a thing until one starts actually hammering the CPU, causing the fans to spin up. On a tablet, a few background processes are very noticeable as they'll start to slow it down and reduce the battery life.

No, they exactly get this. If you want to run a background task, you make your app a desktop application. It will run just like before. I have a Samsung Series 7 Slate - it has all the power of the standard Win7 desktop, and it runs tablet apps. It is the best of both worlds - it runs legacy stuff and it runs new Metro stuff.

This is exactly the holy grail everybody wants. The full PC desktop experience plus a full tablet experience. All on one device. If you want to go full tablet, you can. If you want to go full desktop, you can.

The limitations are universal among Metro applications. There is no distinction between a tablet and a PC.

And this is the exact thing that Microsoft doesn't get. There's a hell of a difference between a monstrous, powerful desktop and a dainty little tablet. I can run lots of processes on my desktop and I wouldn't even notice a thing until one starts actually hammering the CPU, causing the fans to spin up. On a tablet, a few background processes are very noticeable as they'll start to slow it down and reduce the battery life.

Please explain your logic as it seems that you don't get it. You can only have two truly active applications in Metro at the same time. Pretty much everything else will be in an inactive state in the background. So what exactly is there no to get here? These limitations exist for a reason, and the performance differences between ARM and x86 was most likely a driving factor. So how exactly does MS not get it?

The fact is that ARM Windows tablets are going to be consumer devices, they are not meant to be running full fledged desktop apps. If you want a full fleged desktop experience on a tablet with multiple applications running in the background, you will have to go the x86 route.. period..

I expect overtime that this may change over time as the inefficiencies between the two platforms become mitigated, but that is going to take some time.

The point is that metro apps work the same regardless of the available computing power of the hardware they are being run on. They all run on a concept of least available hardware, with constraints that don't scale. So if for instance I am running a metro application on aeight core sixteen thread processor with 32gb of available RAM, Metro apps still background and suspend even though there's no practical reason for them to do so, and I as the user have no control over that behavior.

This makes sense on tablets, the issue is that they're pushing these applications for the desktop as well, where the limitations of metro make far less sense.

1) The fact that metro apps ONLY open on your primary monitor.

2) You can't have more than 1 metro app actively running at a time.

3) You can't control the suspend behavior of non active Metro Apps.

4) You can't control the automatic termination of non-active Metro Apps.

5) All Metro apps are handled as if they're on light weight, low power, battery powered devices regardless of the fact that the OS can actively detect if it's powered in and the relative power of the machine it's running on, is kind of rediculous.

Honestly through Windows Score and power settings the OS can detect my relative hardware level and whether I'm power constrained. So theoretically the OS could automatically toggle these restrictions on or off based on circumstances. It doesn't. As designed right now, the damn thing assumes I'm running on a netbook class of hard ware, far far far away from a wall socket. This to me smacks of laziness and poor design. It may be addressed later, but from what I've seen I don't expect to see it in the RC, and we may be looking at SP1 or later.

I'm a developer and I'm very excited for some of the functionality Win8 and Metro provides, especially contracts, but the inability to remove artificial restrictions and scale UP to better hardware is alarming, as is the fact that they are walling developers and users from having even basic control over the way applications behave on the OS.

I understand that this isn't a constraing for Desktop apps, but they're pushing Metro really hard, and honestly right now they're acting like the Desktop may eventually disappear. I'm not getting the warm and fuzzies on that from reading SInofski's blogs.

Anyway, that's what bugs me from my experience working with the developer preview, and VS2012 beta.

The limitations are universal among Metro applications. There is no distinction between a tablet and a PC.

And this is the exact thing that Microsoft doesn't get. There's a hell of a difference between a monstrous, powerful desktop and a dainty little tablet. I can run lots of processes on my desktop and I wouldn't even notice a thing until one starts actually hammering the CPU, causing the fans to spin up. On a tablet, a few background processes are very noticeable as they'll start to slow it down and reduce the battery life.

No, they exactly get this. If you want to run a background task, you make your app a desktop application. It will run just like before. I have a Samsung Series 7 Slate - it has all the power of the standard Win7 desktop, and it runs tablet apps. It is the best of both worlds - it runs legacy stuff and it runs new Metro stuff.

This is exactly the holy grail everybody wants. The full PC desktop experience plus a full tablet experience. All on one device. If you want to go full tablet, you can. If you want to go full desktop, you can.

Actually I only want that on tablet devices like yours. I DON'T want these features on a pure desktop. The issue is I can turn off the desktop functionality in Windows 8. What I CANNOT turn off is the metro functionality. The entire desktop environment is an App that runs inside the Metro shell for Windows.

Maybe they'll come out with a desktop only version of Win8. They almost certainly will upgrade Win7 to provide support for some of the functionality I'm looking forward to from Win8. What they won't do is compell me to upgrade any of my desktops with the product they're demo'ing right now. If it grows on me, they might get my Laptop. Maybe.

Actually I only want that on tablet devices like yours. I DON'T want these features on a pure desktop. The issue is I can turn off the desktop functionality in Windows 8. What I CANNOT turn off is the metro functionality. The entire desktop environment is an App that runs inside the Metro shell for Windows.

Maybe they'll come out with a desktop only version of Win8. They almost certainly will upgrade Win7 to provide support for some of the functionality I'm looking forward to from Win8. What they won't do is compell me to upgrade any of my desktops with the product they're demo'ing right now. If it grows on me, they might get my Laptop. Maybe.

You turn off the Metro functionality by simply not using it. Win8 simply turns into Win7 with a full screen start menu. There are some marginal changes (better task manager, ribbonized explorer), but otherwise, it's pretty much the same.

If you want a full fleged desktop experience on a tablet with multiple applications running in the background, you will have to go the x86 route.. period..

The point is that if you want to have multiple Metro applications running in the background, you simply can't. It doesn't matter how powerful your system is, you're forced down to the lowest common denominator. Which is a POS ARM tablet with 1GB RAM.

At this point Metro is not designed for legacy desktop power users. I just can't understand how you people do not understand this. Suspending applications to the background in Metro is a power saving measure, one which is required for Windows 8 to be competitive. You are also making it out as those nothing runs in the background which is just not the case, there are several scenarios in which apps will be able to run tasks in the background (see Windows 8 Background Tasks infrastructure)

We have no idea what MS intends to do going forward, for all you know they intend on opening up the app limitation for 'always on' users, or faster machines (maybe by windows rating or something).

The current incarnation of Metro is a clear release strategy, where MS will go afterwards is anyone's guess.

edit: @mlubrov, I tend to agree that those are certainly limitations for desktop users, but please remember this is the first incarnation of Metro whose focus pointed at tablets. I do not disagree that these are certainly big limitations, but think about it from MS's point of view. They had to implement a completely new interface, and they probably had to start somewhere.. i.e with a focus on tablets. Aside from maybe #2 (#1 seems like a limitation as a result of #2), I don't see why any of the other things you mention can't change over time.

The limitations are universal among Metro applications. There is no distinction between a tablet and a PC.

And this is the exact thing that Microsoft doesn't get. There's a hell of a difference between a monstrous, powerful desktop and a dainty little tablet. I can run lots of processes on my desktop and I wouldn't even notice a thing until one starts actually hammering the CPU, causing the fans to spin up. On a tablet, a few background processes are very noticeable as they'll start to slow it down and reduce the battery life.

Bolded for emphasis. I imagine the desktop/workstation type apps (which will not be Metro apps) will work as expected.

I also expect that if Metro really catches on, some of the restrictions will be lifted, or that you can have a Metro front-end to a heftier back-end process. The fear may be that most developers would just put a thin, clunky veneer over an ordinary Windows app, which would make Metro look like crap (see Windows for Tablets) and would use the regular APIs not available on actual tablets. Apple has had considerable success in limiting the usability of legacy code, and MS may be trying to emulate that, at least until Metro is something people actually want.

I think the current version 1.0 of WinRT is not robust enough for desktop (i.e. windowed) usage. As a result, the Metro apps are more restricted. I think MS will slowly with Windows 9 start using WinRT for desktop. I hope.

I also expect that if Metro really catches on, some of the restrictions will be lifted, or that you can have a Metro front-end to a heftier back-end process. The fear may be that most developers would just put a thin, clunky veneer over an ordinary Windows app, which would make Metro look like crap (see Windows for Tablets) and would use the regular APIs not available on actual tablets.

Not really an issue, because you can't really do it. Metro apps are restricted to a subset of WinRT only, you have almost zero access to Win32 API's i.e those not available for use on a tablet. Technically there is a tiny subset (like maybe 5%) still available, but they were merely to fill a gap for specific scenarios. (And I'm not sure if you can submit an app to the store if you do so)

As per the article on ARS earlier this week, only browser manufacturer will have an exemption status for this (at least initially, MS has not really been too clear on this front).

The result is any native Metro app should work regardless of platform, and developers will be forced to embrace metro UI design.

...Honestly through Windows Score and power settings the OS can detect my relative hardware level and whether I'm power constrained. So theoretically the OS could automatically toggle these restrictions on or off based on circumstances. It doesn't. As designed right now, the damn thing assumes I'm running on a netbook class of hard ware, far far far away from a wall socket. This to me smacks of laziness and poor design. It may be addressed later, but from what I've seen I don't expect to see it in the RC, and we may be looking at SP1 or later....

Think about the user experience of what you're asking for, though. As a developer, I completely agree with you, in theory. But in practice this would mean that apps work differently, and lose/gain functionality for no apparent reason as the platform changes. This could never be done transparently, you'd have to make an obvious distinction to help normal users understand what is happening. The switch to the legacy desktop is perfect as such a distinction. You're probably going to want that type of interface for most apps doing more advanced tasks anyway.

For the people that keep wanting to disable metro on the desktop, there is exactly one reason why Microsoft went this way (not allowing it to be disabled):

Make them the same interface and you automatically pick up a ton of support from people that now have to support the touch friendly GUI with their desktop apps anyway. At least assuming everyone doesn't just ignore Metro.

I think my parents would like a simple interface like Metro on their 17" notebook. For some reason though, many Ars readers think my parents should buy a small tablet if they want a simple interface. Even though Windows 8 can do everything Windows 7 can, those Ars readers are still complaining that it gives my parents an easier live. But of course, Ars readers are the most important users, so Microsoft should listen only to them.

I think my parents would like a simple interface like Metro on their 17" notebook. For some reason though, many Ars readers think my parents should buy a small tablet if they want a simple interface. Even though Windows 8 can do everything Windows 7 can, those Ars readers are still complaining that it gives my parents an easier live. But of course, Ars readers are the most important users, so Microsoft should listen only to them.

I guess each parent is different.

My Mom is in her late 70's, Dad in his early 80's. Showing my Dad the preview of Windows 8, his only comments were confusion over what he was looking at (other than shutting down, I don't think he's ever used the Start Menu, his programs are pinned to the Taskbar, with a few main icons on the desktop), I tried to explain it to him but since he like things simple (and didn't like the gaudy XBox look compared to his PGA golf course desktop and familiar icons) he just wanted to be reassured he'd never have to use it.

My parents have almost never had the need for dragging/dropping. Not sure if my Dad's ever done it, never really a need. I'm trying to figure out how I tell my Dad why the Red X of Closure is gone. "Oh, just click and hold at the top of the window and drag down to the bottom until the program disappears" sounds almost as easy as getting my Dad to build his own PC (or use Metro's app switching).

I comforted my Dad with the fact the operating system on his HP machine (Windows 7) should be fine for ages and that was the end of it. I wouldn't even dare subject my Mom to the horrors of Metro. She's a painter, uses pastels and lighter colors. Metro would be an eyesore she would never understand.

Well, I'm interested to see how other people's experiences will be. Talking to another friend that does support, we sat down with it and his jaw was to the floor in horror. "I have a feeling I'm going to be getting a lot of "switchers" (PC to Mac converts)" he says.

I'm also wondering if IE Metro isn't complete, but where does somebody's hundreds of favorites go? Somebody mentioned those all are populated in the Start Menu, too? Wow... That doesn't sound right...

Can anyone please tell me wtf is up with any of the following questions??? (serious):1) the seemingly arbitrary size of tiles2) total lack of (any) customization (my droid does far more than this... even iOS has some decent options)3) the possible use for this layer of interface on a desktop, or laptop?4) layering it on top of a perfectly good OS, that has now become rather gimped?

I'm sorry, but I honestly do not get any sense of good from this Metro business.

(side note / rant) I also despise the word "consumer" in reference to anything other than edible or actually consumable material or goods... I do not eat Windows, I do not burn it, I do not use it as a finite resource... I only license it...(/end rant)

Could they not just separate the two, and forget booting an entire, yet gimped, OS in the background; especially if no tablet user would really want or need to use it??? Maybe the 'preview' stuff is to get a feel from people - one can only hope.

I've played with Windows phones, and a tablet running both 'previews' of Win8 - none of it impresses me in the slightest bit.

I found this quote unbelievable. Makes me think the entire opinion of the Photobucket devs is just paid marketing from MS.

Quote:

They let Photobucket show users notifications and photos other users have uploaded, or other types of updates, before they even click on the application icon. "That provides a richer experience even when you're not using the application," Swanson said. "You can get a quick snapshot. It's completely different from anything iOS or Android supports right now."

1) This is not new. You could've done this with a desktop gadget since Vista in 2006. Why didn't you? Because it wasn't fashionable at the time. Now it's suddenly a cool new feature because it's in a big square on the Start screen.2) This is not "completely different from anything ... Android supports right now." Android has had widgets since day one, and they do the same damn thing.

I am okay with MS trying out some new GUI approaches for the tablet era, and I even think a lot of these ideas will probably work for the average consumer on a laptop as well, but I really hate the spin and fud trying to pretend it's something that it isn't, or that it's innovative in ways that it's not.

The point is that metro apps work the same regardless of the available computing power of the hardware they are being run on. They all run on a concept of least available hardware, with constraints that don't scale. So if for instance I am running a metro application on aeight core sixteen thread processor with 32gb of available RAM, Metro apps still background and suspend even though there's no practical reason for them to do so, and I as the user have no control over that behavior.

So on your 32GB of RAM system, how many Metro apps do you think you'll be actively running? Or do you expect that maybe...just maybe...the idea is that for rigs like that, Desktop apps, which are not going anywhere, are going to be main route to go. It's like complaining that AIM didn't tax your system. AIM wasn't designed for complex tasks. Neither are metro apps.

Quote:

This makes sense on tablets, the issue is that they're pushing these applications for the desktop as well, where the limitations of metro make far less sense.

1) The fact that metro apps ONLY open on your primary monitor.

Given how much you're complaining about metro apps not being good, I find it doubly entertaining that your first complaint is that you can't have more of a thing you don't like. It doesn't make sense. If you have multiple monitors, you're a desktop Windows user. So one monitor is always dedicated to...you guessed it...the desktop. If you're in an environment where you have multiple monitors, are metro apps the best tool for the job?

Quote:

2) You can't have more than 1 metro app actively running at a time.

Uh...false. You can have 2 openly active in your face as well as several backgrounded, still running. For example, today, I was listening to music (background app, still running), viewing my email updates (snapped), while I played solitaire (the bigger part of the screen. I got a facebook message from a friend, because the messaging app was still running processes in the background. That's 3 active, 1 passive, all able to provide information, even if only 2 of them are on-screen. I'm sorry, but you're wrong.

Quote:

3) You can't control the suspend behavior of non active Metro Apps.

Not really sure what you mean by this. You can close them, "wake them" by snapping them into view, and change the track on the background music app by hitting "next" on your keyboard...which is pretty much the same control you have over minimized desktop Windows. How much control do you have over an app when it's minimized in 7?

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4) You can't control the automatic termination of non-active Metro Apps.

Nope, but their state is saved, meaning that even if they're terminated, you resume where you were. What you say is literally true, but I wager for most people, it has little impact on their actual usage. If an app is suspended, but saves its state prior to doing so, and when I resume it, it picks up right where I left it, it's minimal functional difference from the app never shutting down at all. you're still right where you were.

I've only had a metro app shut down on me once, and that's when I was doing some video compression and decided to try to play pinball. The game I had open was closed, but when I re-launched the app, I was right where I had left off.

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5) All Metro apps are handled as if they're on light weight, low power, battery powered devices regardless of the fact that the OS can actively detect if it's powered in and the relative power of the machine it's running on, is kind of ridiculous.

That's because they're designed to be lightweight, low power, consumption apps. It's like complaining that paint isn't Photoshop. Desktop apps aren't going anywhere. Metro apps are just being added. It's like someone is saying "hey man, you want this cheese dip" and you're screaming "no, I already have SALSA. It's got more vegetables, more spice, and more onions. I mean, I like cheese dip too, but it's not as awesome as this salsa". You got people saying "no man, the queso is only for certain things" and you're all "screw your queso, man, even if I like it, it's not as good as what I have".

Dude, chill out. You can have queso sauce AND the salsa you're used to.

Can anyone please tell me wtf is up with any of the following questions??? (serious):1) the seemingly arbitrary size of tiles2) total lack of (any) customization (my droid does far more than this... even iOS has some decent options)3) the possible use for this layer of interface on a desktop, or laptop?4) layering it on top of a perfectly good OS, that has now become rather gimped?

1: Larger tile sizes allow for constantly updating information (the "live" tiles), meaning a person can get information faster with a quick look, rather than having to launch a program to see the information therein. Imagine if your phone vibrated, and you had no idea why, and had to launch a bunch of applications to find the one where something had happened.

Secondly, for simplicity in hitting a target. This is known as Fitt's Law. Now, some think that Metro makes that harder (since you have a much larger screen area (i.e. the whole thing) to scan for your target. I can't speak to that (not my forte), but this is the reason Microsoft did what they did.

2. What are you talking about, specifically? First, you have the entire desktop customizations (same as in Windows 7). Secondly, you have the ability to pick the "theme" and color of the start screen, the lock screen, and the arrangement of the tiles, the size of the tiles, whether they are big or small, etc. . The only thing I think is missing is changing the color of the tiles themselves, but all in all, it's at the same level of customization as WP7 on the Start Screen (which is not the OS, by any stretch of the imagination) and as customizable as Windows 7 on the desktop.

3. On a laptop, it's really easy: synaptics has promised gesture control. So, just like using gestures on a MBA, it's a faster way to get stuff done. I stopped using a mouse on my MBA because touch was faster, and easier. I suspect the idea is the exact same on Windows 8-- make it good to "touch", even if the only thing you're touching is a trackpad.

As far as desktops, Windows 8 does offer some pretty good tools under the surface (storage pools, better file management, faster boot, etc), but I'll admit the Metro interface is not an advantage. It's also not, in my personal experience, a real hinderance to the way I work. However, that's more of a personal thing, and my anecdotal evidence shouldn't be used to be anything more than my personal feelings.

Consider though-- in the next 3 years, what do you expect will sell in greater quantity- laptops & tablets, or desktops? Just a thought as to why Microsoft may be okay with a slight step back for desktops, if laptops and tablets sell well.

4.It really isn't gimped, in my experience. Have YOU played with it? If so, what, EXACTLY, do you think is harder to do? That's what gimped means- it means a loss of power. So what could you do before that you can't do now? What capability has been lost?

I love how everyone talks about the aspects of Windows 8 that are "for tablets"...like there's this vast market of Windows tablets that everyone's going to buy...next year... It's a good thing Microsoft is "prepared" for the upcoming "tablet glut"...all those "tablet users"...

When in reality there's a huge iPad market, a few miserable "me-too" failures and absolutely nothing else.

It's like they're taking for granted that the abstract idea of "tablets," in and of itself (the popularity of which is 100% generated by Apple's product) guarantees that people will go buy their upcoming shot-in-the-dark products.

That's not entirely true. The user can grant an app additional background resources by choosing it as one of their 6 lock screen apps.

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5) All Metro apps are handled as if they're on light weight, low power, battery powered devices regardless of the fact that the OS can actively detect if it's powered in and the relative power of the machine it's running on, is kind of rediculous.

Windows 8 restricts some resources differently based on whether you're on battery of plugged in. Many of the resource constraints scale up on more powerful machines. For example, background tasks have restricted CPU time. But that CPU time can go a lot farther on a fast CPU.

That's not entirely true. The user can grant an app additional background resources by choosing it as one of their 6 lock screen apps.

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5) All Metro apps are handled as if they're on light weight, low power, battery powered devices regardless of the fact that the OS can actively detect if it's powered in and the relative power of the machine it's running on, is kind of rediculous.

Windows 8 restricts some resources differently based on whether you're on battery of plugged in. Many of the resource constraints scale up on more powerful machines. For example, background tasks have restricted CPU time. But that CPU time can go a lot farther on a fast CPU.